


The Opposite Must Be True

by TUNiU



Category: Star Trek: Discovery
Genre: Angst, Hugh Culber being a snarky snark, Jett Reno being a snarky snark, M/M, Men Crying, Paul Stamets being in pain, Sadness, Spoilers, spoilers for Discovery s03e02: Far From Home
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-24
Updated: 2020-10-24
Packaged: 2021-03-08 21:46:18
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,505
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27183329
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TUNiU/pseuds/TUNiU
Summary: Hugh explains at the end just why he stayed on the Discovery with Paul. But first some other stuff happens because the episode left Paul in a slight and tight predicament.
Relationships: Hugh Culber/Paul Stamets
Comments: 7
Kudos: 97





	The Opposite Must Be True

“Honey, can you come out now?” Hugh asked sweetly. On the video stream from Jett’s padd, he watched Paul just laying on his back in the jeffries tube, breathing heavily.

Paul opened his eyes and stared upside down into the camera of Jett’s drone inches from his face. “ _Um, not really,_ ” he admitted. He pressed his left hand to his chest and then brought it into the drone’s light. His palm was red with blood.

“Shit,” Jett whispered.

“Paul?” Hugh asked sternly even as his mind raced thinking about how to retrieve his husband safely. He looked around the room: he needed something with wheels.

Paul settled back down, and said, “ _so the good news is I’m not bleeding out again_.”

Hugh wandered over to a repair station along the wall and opened the cabinet. When it didn’t have what he needed, he opened every cabinet he found in the room. He found several toolkits and emergency medkits along the way. “Uh-huh,” he said absently, still looking for something to help. It would be impossible to get a stretcher up into the tube and just dragging Paul out would cause more trauma to the wound.

“What's the bad news?” Jett asked obediently.

Hugh turned to her. He couldn't believe she was encouraging Paul. She was sitting twisted to the right in her work cart, trying to stretch her back.

“ _I have too much experience with bleeding out to know what it feels like when I’m not_ ,” Paul answered sullenly.

Her work cart was on a wheeled platform.

“Get up,” Hugh told her a little brusquely.

“What?” she asked.

“Stand up for two seconds.”

Jett pushed herself slowly up out of her seat. Hugh lifted the shelved seat up off its wheeled frame and placed it back on the floor next to the frame just in time for Jett to collapse back down into her seat. 

“Gotcha,” Jett said, and she tapped on her screen. 

“ _Hey, where are you going_?” Paul called plaintively as the drone flew away from him, back down the tube the way he’d come.

“We’re rescuing you,” Jett snarked. “You’re welcome.”

The drone exited at the ladder above Hugh’s head. A small manipulator arm extended from the metal chassis. Hugh held the frame up and the drone floated down and grabbed it. It flew back up into the tube, the wheeled frame clanging against the walls. Hugh slung a medkit across his back by the strap and turned to Jett. 

“See if you can contact sickbay,” he told her. “Have them send a stretcher.” Then he climbed the ladder. 

Following the drone, he wheeled the frame in front of him down the narrow jeffries tube. It was slow going. At once, Hugh marvelled at Paul’s strength to make the journey, injured and scared; and at Paul’s stupidity to make the journey, injured and scared.

“Hey,” Paul called out when he saw the drone returned.

It was tight and cramped and Hugh had to stand the frame on its side against the tube wall so he could literally climb over Paul. He straddled Paul’s legs to get to his chest. Back down below, Jett helpfully hovered the drone so the camera light shone on Paul’s chest.

“Hi, honey,” Paul greeted adoringly staring up at Hugh’s face.

“So whose brilliant idea was this?” Hugh asked as he grabbed the zipper at Paul’s neck and pulled down, opening the uniform jacket.

Paul glanced at the drone for a split second.

“ _Don't look at me like that_ ,” Jett spoke to them through the speaker.

“It was a team effort,” Paul said.

Hugh spun the medkit around his back so it faced his front. He opened it and retrieved a scalpel. He slit open Paul’s bloody undershirt to reveal the burst jagged scar from his recent impalement which he used the kit’s tricorder to scan. 

Even propped on his elbow, twisted up in a narrow jefferies tube, made narrower by a wheeled frame and Paul himself, Hugh relaxed. A weight Hugh hadn't even realized he carried released from his shoulders. It was all surface bleeding. The regenerated tissue from the deepest parts of the impalement that had cut into Paul’s lung was holding closed. 

“I’m sorry,” Paul said. He was looking at Hugh softly.

Their faces were inches apart in the tiny space.

“You seem to be making a habit of saving the ship at the expense of your health,” Hugh said.

Paul shook his head minutely. “It’s not for the ship,” he admitted.

Hugh caressed Paul’s cheek. He felt all his love shining out as a smile to his husband. “I’m still mad at you.”

A quick swipe with the kit’s minor regenerator stopped the bleeding enough for Hugh to judge it safe to move Paul. He backed away off of Paul’s legs and set the wheeled frame flat on the floor. The drone pulled back to give Paul clearance. Paul planted his shoulders and feet on the floor and pushed up, shouting a bit with the effort.

Hugh quickly pushed the frame forward between Paul’s shoes and under his ass and back. Paul sank back down, now elevated slightly by the wheels.

Hugh turned around in the tight space so that he was facing the way they’d come. He grabbed Paul by the foot and began wheeling him down the tube. Paul quickly got his limbs best arranged so they stopped banging against the metal walls but not without grumbling about how undignified the whole thing was.

“I’m sorry, did you just say “thank you, my darling husband, for coming to get my fool ass?”” Hugh asked, huffing his way along.

“You’re really making up for missing snarking at me these past months,” Paul asked, “Aren’t you?”

“I think I am,” Hugh admitted, recalling his unsympathetic words earlier about Paul's brains being scrambled like an egg after his coma. “Is it too much?” 

“No, you can keep at it.”

The tube bent to the left and Hugh didn't mean to, but he didn't give Paul enough clearance to make the turn without bumping his elbow.

“Ow,” he exclaimed pointedly. 

Hugh jostled the foot he was holding in acknowledgment and apologized, “sorry.”

Jett helpfully led them back out by flying the drone in front of them. When Hugh got to the opening, he stopped and considered his options. So soon after having power restored, the Discovery would still be prioritizing systems. Internal sensors would be ignored in favor of powering external systems and weapons. No internal sensors meant no site-to-site transporters. All of which meant Paul would have to climb his own way down the ladder to the floor below. The drone hovered in open space level with Hugh who was still in the jeffries tube.

“Okay, we’re gonna take this nice and slow,” Hugh grabbed the ladder railing above the tube frame and pulled himself out so that his feet were on the railings below the frame. He pulled Paul until he was right at the edge, then took a step down. “I want you to come out a step above me.”

Paul flipped off the wheels and landed on his hands and knees. He slowly backed up and dropped his legs to the ladder rungs in front of Hugh.

“Good,” Hugh said, “now we’re going down, _slowly_.”

“I’m gonna fall on you,” Paul said and rested his head on the rung beside his hand.

“That just means you’ll have a softer landing then if you didn’t.” Hugh took a step down. Paul took a step down. 

Together they descended down the ladder slowly. When Hugh’s feet touched down onto the floor, he braced his hands on Paul’s waist and guided him down the last two rungs.

Immediately, a nurse wheeled a stretcher towards them. Together they lifted Paul onto the elevated surface. He landed with a thump and tried to sit up.

“Ow!" Paul complained pointedly.

Hugh took the scanner back out of his kit and scanned. There was nothing wrong with Paul that hadn’t been wrong with him fifteen minutes ago. He poked Paul’s forehead to force him to lay all the way down. “You know it’s times like this I’m reminded of the first Enterprise’s doctor.”

Paul reared back warily.

The nurse handed Hugh a tray of medical supplies. Hugh took a hypospray and loaded a cartridge of antibiotic because that jeffries tube had been filthy with dust and grease and who-knew-what and Paul had just rubbed his bleeding self all over it.

“Why?” Paul asked.

“He once said, “ _I swore to do no harm_ ,”” Hugh quoted. “ “ _I can inflict as much pain as I want”_ ,” he continued and injected Paul with the hypospray.

“He never said that!” Paul argued.

“Take him back to the regeneration unit,” Hugh instructed the nurse. “Make sure he stays there for five cycles. Sit on him if you have to.”

“I have a chest wound!”

“Sit on his legs.”

“Seriously?”

“You’re not dying honey,” Hugh answered. “I just ran half the length of the ship to see you crawling about, against doctor’s orders, but right now I gotta get back to work. Also, I love you.”

“You keep saying that.”

“I’m gonna keep saying that, because I love you.”

Paul smiled. “I love you too,” he called out as the nurse wheeled him away. 

Once they were out of sight, Hugh hung his head down, eyes closed. He took a deep breath. Then another. When he opened his eyes, he saw Jett still sitting in her again-rollable work trolley, slowly stepping herself backwards out of the room. “You’re headed straight to sickbay, _right_?” he called out.

Jett stopped and looked at him. “Yup,” she answered unconvincingly.

He was surrounded by fool engineers. He smiled and said, “great, I’ll help you.” He walked up to her, grabbed the trolley by the handles on the back and twisted her around so he could roll her through the corridors. By the time Hugh got Jett to sickbay, this time able to use the turbolifts for his journey, Paul was gone, back to the regeneration unit.

It was a horrible thing to know as a doctor, but every crewman who was going to die, had already died, and the rest of the injured crewmen were either being monitored for relapse, or they had been sent back to work or their quarters for rest, as the case may be. A bed was now available for a walking wounded crewman who had stayed away from sickbay in favor of those who had needed it more. However, as soon as Hugh had gotten Jett laying on a biobed, ready for scanning and more in-depth treatment of her spine, the emergency alarm rang out.

Jett leaned up, and Hugh put his hand on her shoulder to stop her getting up. “Stay,” he told her. She lay back down. 

Hugh waved a nurse over to start treating Jett, as he grabbed a padd from a nearby station. He swiped away the previous user’s log-in and used his name and password to see the details of the incoming medical alert: Transporter Room One reported Phillipa Georgiou had several deep penetrating laser wounds on her chest but was conscious and walking.

Hugh’s day had started with him packing his stuff for his berth on the Enterprise and his day hadn’t ended yet. He tugged off the depleted medkit from before and swapped it for a fully stocked one from the sickbay cabinet. Then he headed out towards Transporter Room One.

* * *

Hugh didn’t feel secure leaving sickbay for several more hours. In that time, he had barely treated Phillipa before she stalked off out of his care against his advice; he had finished Jett’s treatment for her spine, telling her to lay down as much as possible for the next several days; he had signed off on all the paperwork and treatment plans for the day’s casualties, and he had been forcefully pushed out of the room by Doctor Tracy Pollard, with the instructions to eat, bathe and sleep, preferably in that order.

Unfortunately, his berth was back on the Enterprise. The decision to stay on Discovery for its journey to the future had been a last minute change. He’d been walking along the gangway between the two ships and stopped in the middle, viscerally understanding that if he stayed on Enterprise, while Discovery left he would never see Paul again. Even at Hugh’s worst after his resurrection, Paul had still been there, almost a spectre in the background of life, when he wasn’t trying to reconnect with his alive-again husband. So he’d turned back, determined to chase that feeling Paul used to kindle in his past-self. Seeing Paul impaled had hurt so bad, like it was the universe telling Hugh, ‘ _see what would have happened if you hadn’t come back, he would have died and you never would have known_.’ and all Hugh could think at that moment, seeing Paul bleeding out on the biobed, was: ‘ _he’s mine, you can’t have him_.’ All the subsequent time had been spent working in sickbay, healing as many casualties as he could, with that brief stop to chase after his husband. 

There hadn’t even been anytime to stop and ask Paul if he was still welcome in their quarters. Which was why he found himself standing in front of Paul’s door, pushing the chime button, not sure if he would be allowed in.

“ _Come in_ ,” Jett’s voice called out.

The door opened at her statement. Hugh took one step inside and stopped, staring.

Paul lay in bed, his head on his pillow, dressed in his red pyjamas. Jett lay on the bed, perpendicular to him, with her legs curled over Paul’s.

She poked Paul’s thigh. “Look who’s home,” she said.

Paul glared at her, and said, “I weep with happiness that you can leave now.”

“Why are you here?” Hugh asked, walking fully into the room so the door could slide closed behind him. “I told you to rest in bed. I thought the “ _your own_ ” part of the sentence was implied.” He unzipped his uniform jacket. Covered in blood as it was there was no point in laundering it. He unclipped the badge and left it on the table. He threw the fabric across the room where it landed half in the replicator chamber. The unit bleeped with an error tone. He shuffled over and flipped the rest of the jacket into the receptor. The replicator slowly dematerialized the fabric.

“So, fun fact:” Jett began, “the ice knocked a massive hole in my wall. I now have a spectacular view of space, for as long as I can hold my breath.”

“That blows,” Hugh commiserated.

“And sucks too,” Jett quipped.

“Your stuff?”

“Meh, it was all fabricated, I still have the patterns.”

“Is this an important conversation?” Paul whined. “Because I can just leave you to it.”

Jett shimmied to make the mattress bounce slightly. “Hush you,” she told Paul. To Hugh, she said, “I’ve had to lay on him for hours, he keeps trying to get up and do work.”

“I can’t feel my feet,” Paul said.

“Thank you for helping my husband rest,” Hugh said sincerely. “But I think it’s my turn now.”

“Right-o.” Jett slowly sat up and used Paul’s knee to lever herself up off the bed.

“Ow.”

“Love you too, jackrabbit.”

“No, you don’t,” said Paul.

“No, I don’t,” Jett said as the door swished shut behind her, leaving Paul and Hugh alone for the first time in days.

Maybe the best way to do this was to pretend nothing was strange. So, Hugh flipped off his shirt and stepped out of his pants. They too went in the replicator. He typed in the commands to create a set of pajamas for his own measurements. He could feel Paul’s eyes watching him. He heard Paul’s breathing change when he dropped his underwear and walked naked to the bathroom.

Hugh didn’t bother with a water shower, it would take too long and he just wanted to lay down as soon as possible. He chose the sonic option and let the dirt and blood and sweat just coalesce off his skin. It left his skin feeling tingly and fresh, as the sonic also destroyed the top most layer of dead dermis from his body. By the time the cycle was done, his clothes were fabricated. Not being wet, he just walked to the replicator, naked still. He unfurled the fabric and stepped into the warm underwear, then into the pants. Finally he dragged the shirt over his head.

He had kept himself turned away from Paul the entire time, because it was easier to pretend if he didn’t see the emotions on his husband’s face. But he had to turn around to get in bed. The time for pretending was over. He turned.

Paul was watching him hungrily. “Can I hold you, just, please, let me hold you?” Paul begged. 

Hugh climbed into bed on Paul’s left side. He curled up against his side. Hugh rested his hand on Paul’s chest, rubbing firmly to feel his skin through the fabric. The raised scar from the impalement was gone. Hugh let his head drop to Paul’s shoulder in relief. All the damage was gone, gone like it had never existed. All that was left was the memory of seeing Paul bleeding out in sickbay: not sure if he could save him; but damn sure he would tell Paul he was staying with him for good before he placed him into a coma he might never wake from.

Paul pulled and tugged until Hugh was laying under him. He held him tight, with arms and legs wrapped around providing pressure and comfort.

“I’m sorry I was such an ass to you,” Hugh apologized.

“You were alive again,” Paul whispered. “Nothing else mattered to me.”

“Don’t lie,” Hugh demanded softly.

“Yeah, okay. It sucked. But I figured that was the price.”

“What?”

“The bargain: ‘ _Dear God, please bring Hugh back I’ll give anything if you just bring him back_ ’. I had to give up my love for you to get you back, that was the deal. And I would do it again,” Paul admitted weeping. “Even if you never came back to me, even if you lived your life in the past and I had to read about you in the history books.”

Hugh kissed away Paul’s tears. “No, no, no. I’m here, I’m here, okay?”

“Why did you come back?” Paul asked.

“Because I love you,” Hugh answered.

“Yesterday, whenever yesterday was, you were ready to leave, and just like that, you love me again? I am so thankful for it but, just, how did you turn it around so fast?”

Hugh froze, the answer ballooning in his brain: more words and emotions then he could ever conceptualize fighting for the right to be said. But nothing made sense. He stayed because he had to stay. He loved Paul because he loved Paul.

“I couldn’t stand the thought of brushing my teeth alone for the rest of my life,” Hugh stated. “I knew I wouldn’t ever remarry, because it’s you. You’re it, for me. So I had to stay. Because if I was going to be alone for the rest of my life, maybe you would be too, and I couldn’t believe I was just going to leave you alone, forever, if it was in my power to stay. I can’t do that to you, it’s unspeakable, it’s unfathomable, it’s horrific. It’s what you do to someone you hate. And I don’t hate you. I know I don’t hate you: it’s the exact opposite.”

During that rambling explanation, Paul had shifted over so that he and Hugh were on their sides. Their faces almost touched.

“I know I lost my way. I just lost all my bearings,” Hugh continued. “But standing halfway between Discovery and Enterprise, I had that thought: I’m in opposite-of-hate with Paul.” Hugh squeezed his eyes shut so he didn’t have to see Paul’s face anymore, even as he leaned forward so their heads were touching. “And I know it sounds so fragile, but it just built in me: this awareness that I love you, and I’ve loved you this entire time, but it had just been out of reach. I couldn’t get to it and if I left you I would never get to it again. So I turned around and stayed here with you. Because I love you. And I’m gonna tell it to you over and over so you always know.”

Even with both their faces teary and snotty, Paul kissed Hugh. “Please let me keep you,” Paul whispered against his lips.

“There’s no bargain,” Hugh said. “I’m not going anywhere ever again.”

It was a lie and they both knew it. The future was unknown and such promises couldn’t be kept. Paul’s face crumpled. They both ended up crying their way to sleep; soothing and holding each other through the night.

**Author's Note:**

> I'm sorry I made them cry. This fic was originally going to end with Paul just laying in bed listening to all of Hugh's pent up snark, from months of seeing Paul do stupid stuff. and Paul was going to lay there grinning happily at having his husband back.


End file.
